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Special Report: Modern American history is more complete because journalist Gary Webb had the courage to revive the dark story of the Reagan administration’s protection of Nicaraguan Contra cocaine traffickers in the 1980s. However, Webb ultimately paid a terrible price, as Robert Parry reports.

By Robert Parry

Every year since investigative journalist Gary Webb took his own life in 2004, I have marked the anniversary of that sad event by recalling the debt that American history owes to Webb for his brave reporting, which revived the Contra-cocaine scandal in 1996 and forced important admissions out of the Central Intelligence Agency two years later.

But Webb’s suicide on the evening of Dec. 9, 2004, was also a tragic end for one man whose livelihood and reputation were destroyed by a phalanx of major newspapers – the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times– serving as protectors of a corrupt power structure rather than as sources of honest information.....

Gary Webb was a truly honest journalist, who ended up being intentionally and irreparably maligned by the crooked, deceitful, and mendacious "Fourth Estate," operating under the guise of The New York Times, The Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Times.

He should be remembered as someone who had the raw nerve to go up against the corporate controlled media in an attempt to shed some light on the drug problem in the United States, and how it was being aided and abetted by the U.S. Government. A fact that should be imprinted uponthis nation's collective consciousness.

I consider this one a toss-up. Ordinarily, especially with 'two to the head' you'd have to say he was 'suicided'. But hearing more of the details, including the meticulous way he reportedly handled it, leaving several notes, etc. etc., the murder explanation is hard to support. They'd have to have refined their art to hitherto unknown levels.

"13% of voters think Barack Obama is the anti-Christ,including 22% of Romney voters." Considering that the vote was pretty much split down the middle, this means that 4% of Obama voters think he is the antichrist. Strange. So 4% of Obama voters voted for him because he is the antichrist? What does this say about the methodology? [22%/2=11% of total vote. 13%-11%=2% of total vote. 2%x2=4% of Obama vote.]

Reminds me of the NRA poll I got once in the mail. You can pretty much get whatever results you want by tilting the questions far enough.

Director Cuesta said this about the overall film, "I'm not thinking big message or an indictment film. I'm not Oliver Stone. The movie to me was much more about the burden Gary carries wanting to get to the truth. And what that does to you. I am more interested in seeing a man who goes out and fights what seems like an unwinnable war."

What a weaselly statement. Why make a movie specifically about Gary Webb at all if you're just going to settle for painting a picture of a quixotic lone character challenging some interchangeable windmills instead of a very real covert power structure? Then again, all hope was lost when Peter Landesman was announced as the screenwriter...

And I love how one of the most politically courageous (though also possibly wired and bugfuck crazy) and visionary Hollywood directors is these days a byword for misguided, self-serving and probably deceptive propaganda.